Internal Affliction
by LadyoftheDrow
Summary: It started with civilians. Then Third Class. Then Second Class. Now Sephiroth is down for the count. A simple cold isn't supposed to be able to stop a war. But it has. Multiple OCs. No Pairings.
1. Wutai War on Hold

**Internal Affliction**

"**Wutai War On Hold"**

* * *

><p>"This is getting ridiculous."<p>

Genesis leaned back on the couch in Sephiroth's office, dropping the folder in his grasp on the table between them. "Nearly half of the battalion I'm leading into Wutai in three weeks is on sick leave and of the remaining 52, only eight have shown no sign of _also _falling ill. _Eight _SOLDIERs is not an army."

Sephiroth sighed, reaching up and pinching the bridge of his nose, "A new tactic by Wutai?"

"It's not poison, Sephiroth." The brunette chuckled and shook his head. "They've all simply caught a rather nasty cold. It's been hitting a lot of people lately."

"A cold?" Sephiroth frowned. "A cold decimated a battalion of SOLDIERs?"

How in Gaea could a mere virus take out what Wutai soldiers could not? Something so simple and so _mundane _could not defeat them . . . could it? He picked up the mission brief Genesis had dropped and skimmed the names on the first page. Seconds and Thirds, as well as a few Firsts. He recognized several of the names on the list . . .

"Yes, my friend, a _cold._" Genesis gave the silver-haired swordsman an amused look, "Sneezing, headache, coughing, lethargy, sore throat . . ."

"I know what a cold _is_." He snapped, scowling, "I simply do not understand how it could take out so many SOLDIERs at once. SOLDIERs do not _get _sick."

Genesis snorted and shook his head, "Mako strengthens the immune system and kills off viruses and infections before they can take hold in higher amounts, yes, but the lower ranks _do _catch sick every once in a while. Colds are rather common among the ranks, as there are hundreds of variants. Angeal's puppy has caught it as well, and _he's _Second Class."

Sephiroth frowned again, shaking his head and switched his fingers to his right temple, rubbing at it in an inane attempt to assuage his worsening headache. " . . . has Medical made a report on it?"

"Only to say that it's resistant to all the medications they'd _normally _use for SOLDIERs." Crossing his arms, the pale-eyed man scowled. "It's contagious, so they're insisting on anyone showing signs to be confined to quarters. It's hit both the civilians and the military, around 4% showing immunity and an additional 6% resistance to it."

"A cold only lasts for one or two weeks, surely they will be . . ." Sephiroth paused as he felt a strange itch within his nose and frowned slightly, before continuing, "Recovered by the time –_Hehh-chithu!_"

Genesis let his arms fall and stared incredulously at the General, "I don't believe it . . ."

"It's nothing." Sephiroth grimaced and sniffled slightly. The Crimson Commander gaped slightly, Sephiroth . . . sniffling? It was . . . alien. If he had caught the . . . oh hell no! Genesis quickly got to his feet and moved for the door. "Where are you going?"

He hesitated as his hand grasped the doorknob, "I need to talk to Lazard."

With that, he fled. Leaving Sephiroth to stare at the door in confusion. Hadn't Genesis just _come _from Lazard's Office?

* * *

><p>Over the past two days, Salome Hill had become increasingly short with those she spoke with. Her dark eyes were more often than not leveled into a blank accusing stare or a vicious glare that made even the instincts of a SOLDIER First Class scream '<em>run! Flee! HIDE!'<em>

Normally, the blonde woman was very calm, completing her tasks quickly and promptly. With an impeccable appearance and a well-organized desk, her high-level of efficiency landed her one of the most difficult jobs in Midgar.

Meeting the demanding standards of ShinRa's Silver General.

"_Tchiu!"_ If she had been holding a pencil, it would have snapped.

Oh, that was the last straw!

Suppressing her now furiously twitching eye, the light-haired secretary fished her sleek metallic silver Hephaestus Blade PHS out of her pocket and punched in a number before holding it to her ear. "I need an angelic intervention over here."

"_Who needs rescuing?" _the woman on the other end of the line questioned dryly.

"Most likely me when he retaliates against my attempt to wring his neck."

Her lips quirked at the sound of laughter and she rolled her eyes before hanging up and tucking the cell away securely. Immediately, she returned to sorting through the paperwork in front of her, twitching each time she heard a sound behind her. Ten minutes later, she raised her head to give the visitor a look of utter relief before standing and pointing at the office door imperiously. "Make. Him. Go. Home!"

As if on cue . . ._"Hitchu!"_

Angeal's eyebrows rose as the woman flinched so violently at the sound of the sneeze erupting from the far side of the door that her reading glasses slid down her hawkish nose. Glancing at the door, he decided to seek more intelligence before agreeing to the impromptu 'mission.' "How long?"

"He's had a headache for nearly a week, been sneezing for three days and the only reason he isn't coughing right now is because I replaced his sugar with honey." Salome's chocolate eyes narrowed darkly as she rattled off the information with the ease of practice, "If you can't make him go home, I swear I'll put tranquilizers in his lunch and _help _the Silver Elite kidnap him."

Chuckling, he offered her a small smile, "I'm sure that won't be necessary."

She responded with a dead stare, crossing her arms resolutely. Shaking his head slightly, Angeal stepped past her and knocked on the door, eyes narrowing at the roughness of the voice that answered him. "Come in."

As he opened the door, he gave his friend a cursory inspection. The silver-haired man's skin was even paler than usual bar the inflamed redness of his nose, his brow furrowed in pain, irritation or possibly both. Angeal took in the normal sights of pen and paper and the closed laptop, now accompanied by a lidded travel mug and a small box of tissues.

"You look like hell, Sephiroth." The Banoran shook his head, holding back a smile at the indignant expression he was graced with. "You should go home and rest."

The General raised an eyebrow and glanced at the pile of paperwork on his desk that never seemed to shrink. "You expect all this work to do itself? Besides, I'm . . . not sick. I don't get sick."

"You're turning your secretary into a nervous wreck." He bit back a laugh at the offended yelp from the door behind him, not missing the amused smile his friend made at the sound. "She can handle your work and bring anything that needs your personal touch to your apartment. And whether you like it or not, you _are _sick, and it's only going to get worse before it gets better."

"Worse?"

"Much worse." Angeal chuckled as the other man started to look slightly worried.

_Tchiu! _Sephiroth managed to bring a tissue to his nose just as the sharp sneeze escaped, sounding more like a squeak than a sneeze. The look of utter frustration on his face just made it all the harder for the Banoran to keep from snickering. "Fine, I'll go."

* * *

><p><strong>April 5th, 2011<strong>


	2. Like Dominoes

**Internal Affliction**

"**Like Dominos"**

"Yes, Dad, I'm fine." Zack's blonde candy striper spoke into the phone with an amused tone. "Dad, no, they didn't force me, and I won't catch it, Medical confirmed I was immune. Yes, Dad, I'll tell someone if a patient gets grabby and I can't believe you just asked that."

Zack, though his head was pounding, grinned as the man on the other end retorted loud enough for his enhanced hearing to pick up on the other side of the room. _"Ill men don't always have the will to resist temptation, and you take after your mother a little too much."_

"Hey, you were the one who signed me up for Prep. Don't go changing your mind about my trying to get into SOLDIER." the thirteen-year-old scowled into the receiver this time. "This is a good thing for me, Dad, I'm working with the SOLDIERs, my allowance was doubled, and all the practical classes have been canceled." He rolled his eyes at the next comment. "_Yes_, Dad, I'm keeping my conditioning up independently . . . I know . . . yes . . . yes . . . no . . . of course . . . I'm hanging up now . . . seriously, I'm hanging up in 5 . . . 4 . . . that's just playing dirty, yeah, Mom, love you too, get Dad to stop being a mother hen, would you? That's _your _job. . . He was _supposed to _hear that. Bye, talk to you this weekend."

"Overprotective Dad?" Cloud looked up at the question, and gave his newest friend and favorite patient a small smile.

"Not usually, I think he's just chaffing at the idea I'm on my own out here." A shrug followed. "Thanks for letting me use your phone, Zack."

"Least I can do for you putting up with my moaning and groaning." Zack yawned and adjusted the half-frozen cloth slung across his forehead when it tried to slip down his eyes. "You're gonna make me drink that crapberry stuff again, aren't you?"

"Unless you'd rather spend a month in intensive training to build your muscle back up?"

"It tastes _horrible_."

"Stop whining, you sound like a puppy." The blonde countered, pressing the bottle of reddish fluid that was better known as Grade C Nutripotion, into the SOLDIER Second's hand.

Zack gave him a tired glare, but tugged the sport cap open with his teeth, taking a long sip before giving him a sulky look.

"Drink it all or I'll give you a double dose this afternoon." Cloud warned, though he'd come to conclude that Zackary Fair was his favorite assignment. The teen was only a year his senior, but had been a SOLDIER for over a year already. He was probably one of the youngest SOLDIERs on base, as it was, most of the boys in the _Zero Program_ were older than Zack.

He'd heard some nasty complaints and insults from some of the more miserable patients he'd been assigned in the past three weeks. Everything from his somewhat androgynous features and his relationship with his father was brought up. Most were apologetic afterwards but some . . . . The petite blond now had another half a dozen names added to his list of people to avoid.

"Yes, ma'am!" Zack saluted, and gave him a grin.

Cloud glowered, hands on hips, only adding to the feminine image, cornflower blue eyes widened at the look, and he let out a flabbergasted stutter, "What the hell, you glare like Angeal!"

The blond started, tilting his head, "Really? My friends said I glare like my Dad. . ."

"Well, Your Dad is like a shorter, skinnier, light-haired version of Angeal, so . . ." Zack trailed off with a considering look. "Hey, didn't you say that your Dad mentored Angeal? Doesn't that in some weird SOLDIER way make you Angeal's little brother?"

"I . . . guess so?" the blond shrugged, he tried not to think too much about his dad's former position in SOLDIER. He got enough strife over it as it was, every time he scored well people assumed the teacher had fudged the grade out of respect for his father, and if he got a bad score, it was usually because the teacher hadn't liked his father. He hadn't dared bring it up with his father, it'd just be fuel for the fire.

Hell, many of them didn't even consider Sky Strife a real SOLDIER because he didn't have Mako. After all, all _real _SOLDIERs have Mako. You'd think they'd respect him more for becoming the head of the ShinRa military at the age of 19 with only his natural skills.

There was an electronic chirp at his hip and Cloud lifted the robin egg blue scrub shirt to look at his pager, grimacing at the name on the screen. "Gotta go. See you later, alright?"

"Don't let the dirty old men get you down, Cloud, they're just jealous." The Gongagan smiled impishly.

Cloud snorted, throwing him a small smile, before grabbing his back and ducking out. Old men indeed . . . if his patients were old men, what did that make him? Middle-aged?

* * *

><p>The brunette woman fished through the many pockets of her black trousers in frustration, trying to remember which one she'd tucked the illegal copy of her immediate superior's keycard. With a quiet cry of success, she brandished the white plastic and swiftly slotted it through the reader. She looked just as victorious as Genesis did when he'd gotten his hands on front row tickets to the showing of his favorite interpretation of Loveless.<p>

The door opened easily and silently, and she dropped her bag on a table, unclipping her ID badge and tossing it beside it. _Eveline Simmons_. SOLDIER Secretary. Glancing about the room, she scowled at the lack of any sign of her superior and inched towards the bedroom, peering inside the open door.

There was a telltale lump on the bed, silken sheets drawn up over the head of the man she was searching for. Promptly stepping up to the edge, she gave a sharp poke of a long-nailed finger to what was either his shoulder or his ass. It was hard to tell what with how curled up he was. She received a moan in response, and tugged the sheets off his head, where she was subject to a sulky glare that lacked the usual fire.

"You're such a drama king." She muttered, ignoring his immediate sputter of protest. "Come on, what's wrong with you this time?"

"I caught that damn plague." He sighed, straightening out somewhat but not daring to pull the sheets back over his head.

"It's far from a plague, Genesis. Just a really nasty cold or flu." She raised an eyebrow. "And you've got far too much work to be done to hide away from it."

"Evie . . ." he pouted, and she tightly restrained the urge to melt at the cuteness. "Even if I go in, someone'll notice I'm sick and I'll get confined to quarters down in the Labs."

"True, Hollander never does like to let you two out of his sight when you're ill." She pursed her lips, then sighed with a shake of her head. "Fine then, I'll keep people from finding out you're sick, but in exchange you need to catch up on your paperwork, got it?" She paused again at his hopeful look. "I don't have access to Nutripotion, so I'll have to enlist one of the boys from Zero to get it for you."

He made a face, but remained silent on the matter. Eveline gave him a thoughtful look, "Who did you catch it from, anyway? You haven't done any work with the SOLDIERs recently . . ."

"Sephiroth."

"Seriously?" a nod was her only response.

If the General was really sick too, then that left SOLDIER weak, if Wutai chose to attack when two of their best were down for the count on top of all lesser ranks that were already down . . . _Minerva, _she hoped Wutai was getting hit just as hard by this.

* * *

><p><strong>LOTD Terms of Interest<strong>

**Zero Program **– This is like a preparatory program with lots of one-on-one work. The participants are all either relatives of active/retired SOLDIERs or from wealthy families. Zeros, also called Mini-SOLDIERs get better bunks, better food, better uniforms, and they even get a larger 'allowance' than regular Cadets. They are given more responsibility than Cadets, including higher security access. It isn't uncommon to see a Zero on the SOLDIER floor, usually in the company of a SOLDIER who has taken interest in their training.

**Nutripotion **– A powdered drink containing all the vitamins, minerals, and calories a SOLDIER might need. It is closely monitored by ShinRa and only available to employees due to being laced with Mako and a steroidal compound.

* * *

><p><strong>Written – <strong>July 01, 2011  
><strong>Posted – <strong>July 03, 2011  
><strong>Written to – "Ignition" <strong>by _Tobymac  
><em>**Word Count –** 1,362


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